


Me and You (Are Not Boyfriends)

by dancriesduringsex



Category: Phandom/The Fantastic Foursome (YouTube RPF)
Genre: M/M, grey aromantic!Phil, queerplatonic!phan
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-02-11
Updated: 2016-02-11
Packaged: 2018-05-19 18:28:56
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,246
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5976832
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/dancriesduringsex/pseuds/dancriesduringsex
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Dan and Phil are a lot of things - best friends, flat mates, co-workers - but they aren’t really boyfriends.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Me and You (Are Not Boyfriends)

**Author's Note:**

> Also posted on my tumblr, same username :)

All Dan can seem to do right now is stare at his ceiling and breathe.

He doesn’t know what’s wrong with him - it’s not like there’s anything too negative happening in his life - he just…

All he wants to do is lie still and try to block out his thoughts.

Even from all the way up in his bedroom, he can hear the sound of the front door opening and closing, followed by the familiar sound of Phil coming up the stairs paired with plastic bags brushing together.

Dan tries to focus on the noises, closing his eyes, as Phil walks down the hall toward their bedrooms.

“You got back in bed?” Phil asks, peeking in the doorway.

“Mm,” Dan hums in reply.

Phil doesn’t reply, just goes into his own room to put his bags down. Dan knows Phil told him what he went out for, but he can’t seem to remember now. Dan sighs, not opening his eyes as he grabs a pillow and presses it down on top of his face.

He hears a muffled chuckle from the doorway. “You could suffocate like that,” Phil says, climbing onto Dan’s bed beside him.

“Don’t care,” Dan replies.

Phil lies down directly beside Dan, careful not to actually touch him as that can sometimes make Dan feel worse if he doesn’t ask first; he lays just close enough that his best friend knows he’s there. “Did your chat with your mum not go well?”

Dan shrugs. “It was fine. She’s fine. Everyone’s fine.”

Phil turns his head in Dan’s direction. “But..?”

Dan lifts the pillow off his face just enough that he can peek at Phil briefly. “But the usual,” he says, squashing the pillow back down on his face. “You know. She’s worried that I’m not, like, dating or anything.”

Phil shrugs, looking back up at the ceiling. “You don’t really have time to date.”

“That’s not the point,” Dan says. “You know I wouldn’t want to if I could.”

Phil decides not to say anything, just listens as Dan tries to talk through his muddled thoughts.

“I just…” he says. “I like the idea of a relationship, you know? Getting married one day, maybe. And I kinda think I want kids when I’m older and not living in an apartment and not busy and can handle that kind of responsibility, but…”

“But?”

Dan shakes his head, pulling the pillow down so it’s lying on his stomach. “You and I are close enough that I don’t really need a romantic relationship, you know?”

Phil nods.

“And you and I know that we’re okay being platonic and being together for as long as we’re happy but I don’t know how to explain that to people outside of us.”

Phil shrugs. “It was easier for me to just tell my mum you’re my boyfriend.”

Dan rolls his eyes. “We’re not really boyfriends though.”

Phil can’t help the way the corners of his mouth quirk up on amusement. “I thought you were the one who didn’t like labels, Mister “sexually ambiguous”.”

Dan makes a face. “Not having labels is all fine when I’m dealing with people who don’t know me so well on the internet, but that doesn’t help me explain to my family why I haven’t been in a relationship since I was a teenager.”

“You are technically in a relationship,” Phil says.

“A romantic one.”

“Does it matter if we’re romantic or not? As far as they’re concerned we might as well be boyfriends.”

Dan breathes a noise somewhere halfway between a sigh and a groan. This is probably the tenth time they’ve had this exact conversation.

Phil takes out his phone and - not for the first or the last time - types aromantic into google. He feels that the term suits him much more closely than Dan - Dan feels more of a tug for romantic attention than Phil really does - but he thinks some article on the internet may be able to help his friend give their relationship a title.

They lay in silence for a long while. Phil googles while Dan rolls onto his stomach and cuddles a pillow.

“Queerplatonic,” Phil says eventually.

“Huh?” Dan asks, suddenly pulled from his thoughts.

“You could say we’re queerplatonic,” Phil replies, looking over at Dan. “It’s the the word people came up with for relationships that are more than friendships but less than whatever else they could be.”

“Queerplatonic,” Dan repeats, leaning up on his elbows. “That’ll be annoying to explain.”

“Or,” Phil replies, dropping his phone on the floor because he doesn’t feel like putting it back in his pocket and rolling onto his side so he can see Dan a little easier. “You could just make your life easy and tell your family I’m your boyfriend.”

“If you keep saying that, you’re going to slip up and say it where the Phandom can hear and they’ll go crazy.”

Phil shudders at the thought of the storm that that word could stir up. “Sorry,” he says.

They lie in silence for a while longer. The sun is going down and the room is getting darker but neither move to turn on the light.

“Phil?”

“Yeah?”

“Do you remember when you told me you loved me?”

Phil laughs. “I thought I made you cry when I said it wasn’t really the way you were thinking.”

Dan shakes his head, smiling. “I was thinking, just now, you said it wasn’t real love but I think you do love me. It’s just Phil-love, not romantic love.”

Phil nods, his hand creeping over to hold Dan’s. He doesn’t usually like gestures like this, but he knows Dan likes them so he indulges him from time to time. “Dan?”

“Phil?”

“Are you really happy being in a not-so-romantic relationship?”

Dan shrugs. “Right now I am.”

Phil’s grip tightens on his hand just slightly. “Good,” he says. “Cause I don’t know what I’d do if you moved out.”

Dan laughs. “Why? Would having no one’s cereal around to steal make you sad?”

Phil frowns, sounding uncharacteristically thoughtful. “No, I’d just miss you. I think.”

Dan looks over at Phil. “Oi, I’m supposed to be the waffly one here. Stop it.”

Phil sits up. “Get up then,” he says. “If we keep laying here you’re going to make me say more silly things.”

Dan shakes his head, smiling. “Like the word boyfriend?”

“I take the word boyfriend very seriously, actually,” Phil says. “Because if I ever felt the need to have one, I’d want it to be you.”

“There you go with the waffling again.”

“Then get up so I’ll stop.”

Dan chuckles and stands. “I guess I’ll talk to them about it while we’re on holiday,” he says. “Explaining what queerplatonic means can’t be too much harder than explaining youtube to my grandma.”

 

…

 

It was, in fact, much more difficult than explaining youtube to his grandma.

“We really don’t mind that you’re gay, Bear, we understand,” his mother told him.

“That’s not it, though,” Dan insisted. “I know I’m into men, Phil just isn’t my boyfriend.”

“Queerpla… platonic? Is that what you called it? Are you sure that’s a real thing?” his father asked.

Dan came home from his holiday feeling more exhausted than when he’d left.

He’s glad Phil’s there when he gets home because he drops his things in the hallway and goes to where his best friend is seated on the sofa. “Welcome home,” Phil says, not looking up from his laptop.

Dan frowns, moving the computer and flopping onto the sofa with his head on Phil’s lap. “I feel like I need a week long nap,” he mutters against Phil’s belly.

Phil smiles down at him sympathetically, moving hesitantly to pet Dan’s hair. “They’ll come around eventually,” he says, trying to sound supportive.

“You were right,” Dan says. “It would be easier to just say you’re my boyfriend. But it would be a lie. And I don’t want to lie. I’ve done enough of that for the internet, I don’t want to have to for my family.”

Phil sighs. He doesn’t completely understand Dan’s intrinsic need to feel completely and totally understood, but he can appreciate it - he almost admires Dan’s loyalty to himself, in fact. He just wishes it wouldn’t make his friend feel so stuck when he feels like he’s not measuring up or, in this case, like he’s being dishonest.

After a few minutes, Dan has let himself calm down a bit and looks up at Phil. “Sorry I just came in here like this, do you want me to get off you now?”

Phil shrugs. “I don’t mind.”

Dan nods, closing his eyes. “Thank you.”

Phil talks to Dan while the brunet rests - not quite sleeping as he listens to Phil tell him about burning the grilled cheese he tried to make yesterday and rewatching Buffy  _ again _ since everything new he wants to see he wants to watch with Dan.

Dan doesn’t mind that he never actually sleeps, listening to Phil talk relaxes him just as much.

 

…

 

Dan sometimes thinks back on his and Phil’s history together.

How Dan used to have such a crush on him before they knew each other. 

How they used to have Skype sex because - while Phil is grey-aromantic and Dan doesn’t really care enough to analyze if or how he fits on the aromantic spectrum - neither of them are asexual and they were undeniably attracted to one another physically.

How Dan’s crush morphed into something less romantic over time but how he’s always sat Phil up on a pedestal.

How Phil has always sort of set Dan apart from all the other people he’s ever known as well.

How they still have platonic sex sometimes - even if that sounds weird to think in his head.

Dan know his relationship with Phil isn’t usual, but it’s what works for them.

 

…

 

Reading fanfiction is usually Dan’s pastime, but Phil partakes occasionally - when he’s feeling bored and sadistic.

The Dan and Phil the Phandom portrays are mostly very romantic. They talk all the time about how much they love each other and they spoon and touch each other all the time and they have loads of romantic sex. Other times they’re portrayed with one of them being very subservient to the other - usually Dan subbing for Phil.

Phil can’t see it. He can’t hear all those pretty words coming from his mouth. He can’t imagine holding Dan’s hand because it’s something  _ he  _ wants to do. He definitely can’t imagine himself and Dan as anything but equals. He wants to laugh when he thinks about Dan calling him something like “daddy” seriously.

He can’t put himself into the fiction.

But it still makes his heart ache somehow. 

He wonders sometimes it this is why Dan reads the fanfiction - to imagine what his relationship with Phil could be like if the two of them were more normal. He wonders if Dan is really happy not being a romantic relationship - no matter how many times Dan assures him it’s alright.

 

…

 

They fight sometimes - because everyone does - and they always find ways to make up.

They only usually share beds when they’ve been hanging out in each other's rooms and are too lazy to go back to their own - or if Dan has watched or played something scary and is afraid to sleep alone.

They have separate bank accounts but take turns buying groceries.

They go on most of their holidays together, they work together, they live together.

For all that they have separately, they share so much of their lives it wouldn’t be a clean break if they wanted to move on alone.

The thing Dan’s family doesn’t understand is that the title isn’t what’s important. Boyfriends? Queerplatonic partners? Whatever you call them, they still live together and care about one another more than anyone else. Hell, calling them husbands might be accurate from a certain - though not legally viable - viewpoint.

When Dan’s mum comes to visit before Dan’s birthday, she comes to see some of this.

How there is no clear line telling what belongs to who in any of their flat but their bedrooms. How they seem to move together as opposed to around one another when they’re trying to complete a task. How they talk to each other like half the conversation isn’t even happening out loud.

“Thank you for visiting, Mrs. Howell,” Phil says, when she prepares to leave.

She smiles and hugs him. “How many times have I told you? You can call me mum too.”

“Mum,” Dan whines as Phil laughs. “I already told you -”

“I know you’re not “together”, you’ve told me,” she cuts him off, waving her hand at him dismissively. “But he’s with you and he doesn’t seem to be going anywhere so I’m claiming him as another son.”

“I get to be an honorary Howell?” Phil asks.

“Well, you could be a real one, but my son is obnoxiously stubborn,” she replies. “Gets it from his father, I swear.”

Dan doesn’t mention  _ her _ stubborn streak. “Alright, mum, go before you start suggesting something even crazier.”

“ _ Actually _ ,” she says with a giggle and a grin. “I still want some darned grandchildren, one way or another. If you’ve got to kidnap someone, I will be a grandmother, Daniel.”

Phil laughs so hard he fall back onto the sofa while Dan runs a hand over his face. “We’re not kidnapping a child, mum?”

She grins at him mischievously. “We, dear?”

Dan’s ears go red hot. He starts dragging his mum out of the lounge. “Bye, mum,” he mutters when they get to the door. “Your cab is still waiting.”

She cackles good-naturedly, hugging Dan goodbye. “I love you, sweetie,” she says. “I still don’t get it, but I’m glad you’re happy.”

Dan smiles at her. “Thanks, mum.”

She grins again, as she walks out the door adding, “Don’t forget what I said about grandchildren!”

 

…

 

Somewhere between Dan being so ill Phil had to take him to the hospital and the two of them moving in together in Manchester - Dan can’t remember exactly when it was now - the two of them are sat up late watching a Harry Potter marathon, mostly talking.

Phil has been giving him strange looks all night and it’s making Dan nervous but he’s a little too young and a little too unsure to ask what’s wrong - something he won’t grow past for a couple more years.

Somewhere toward the end of Order of the Phoenix, Phil finally works up the courage to say what’s been on his mind all day. “Dan, I love you.”

Dan, who had been focused on the movie, goes rigid and turns to look at his black-haired friend. “What?”

“I love you,” Phil repeats. “But I…”

Dan blinks at him, his heart racing a little. “But what?”

“But I don’t think it’s real love,” Phil says. “I don’t know what real love is meant to feel like but I don’t think it’s this.”

Dan clenches and unclenches his jaw thoughtfully, staring at Phil who is staring at his lap. He told Phil months ago, in a delirium fueled by pain medication, that he’s had a crush on him since before they first spoke to each other. He told him on a completely separate occasion that he thinks he’s falling for him. Phil knows about Dan’s feelings, so why would he say something like this? “Why would you bother telling me, then?” Dan asks, feeling a little defensive of heart that feels like it could break and his stomach that feels like it might be turning over.

“Because you mean more to me than any friend I’ve ever had,” Phil replies, his voice wavering over the words anxiously. “I don’t think it’s love but, whatever my feelings for you are, I don’t like when you’re not around. Whatever you are to me, I don’t want to think about you not being a part of my life.”

“Sure sounds a lot like love,” Dan tells him. “But what do I know?”

Phil looks at him. “I’m sorry that you want different things than I want out of our friendship,” he says quietly. “If you… if it’s too hard for you to be around me knowing that I probably won’t ever love you the way you want me to, I understand if you don’t want to be around me anymore.”

Dan furrows his eyebrows. “Phil, I knew it was a longshot from the beginning that you would return any of my feelings,” he says. Despite feeling a little sad, he knows what Phil means, he doesn’t want to think about his life without Phil either. “I’m not going to ruin our friendship because you don’t want to be my boyfriend.”

Dan is suddenly pulled into a tight - and slightly bony, not that he cares that much - hug.

“Thank you,” Phil says, sounding so relieved Dan can’t help but return the hug.

Later on, on a different night, Phil will tell Dan about people who are aromantic and how he thinks he might be on that spectrum somewhere, right after telling him about the girl he dated once that hated him when he told her he didn’t and probably couldn’t love her.

Dan doesn’t really understand it at first, but listens to Phil and tries.

Shortly after, Dan decides that even the depths of his heart don’t want romance from Phil anymore.

 

…

 

All Dan can seem to do right now is stare at his ceiling and breathe.

There’s nothing wrong this time. He feels fairly pleasant, actually. He just doesn’t have anything to do and sitting with his thoughts is unusually comfortable today.

Even from all the way up in his bedroom, he can hear the sound of the front door opening and closing, followed by the familiar sound of Phil coming up the stairs paired with plastic bags brushing together.

Dan tries to block out the noises as Phil walks down the hall toward their bedrooms.

“You got back in bed?” Phil asks, peeking in the doorway.

“Mm,” Dan hums in reply.

Phil doesn’t reply, just goes into his own room to take his shoes off. Dan sent him out about a half an hour ago to pick up their dinner - as the place they ordered from doesn’t deliver - and he wonders if any of their food got cold on the journey.

He hears a muffled chuckle from the doorway, setting the bags of food in the doorway as he goes to lay beside Dan. “You look like you’re trying to meditate,” Phil says.

Dan shrugs. “I’m having a good day,” he says.

“Oh yeah?” Phil asks, folding his arms under his head.

Dan nods, rolling onto his side to look at Phil. “My mom tried to explain the queerplatonic thing to my grandma but she still didn’t get it.”

Phil cocks an eyebrow. “And it’s still a good day?”

“I decided to just tell her you’re my boyfriend,” Dan replies. “I know she’s never quite going to get it. I’m happy that my mom is starting to getting it though, so it’s a good day.”

Phil smiles at him. “Good,” he says. “Now can we eat before my dinner gets cold?”

Dan laughs, getting up to take their food out to the lounge so they can pick something to watch. 

Their relationship isn’t what people normally think of as a “relationship”.

Dan doesn’t mind though. 

What they have is even better.


End file.
